Tuesday, 1 September 2009

Climate Camp in London

Raising awareness about human induced climate change

Icenian, new to the idea of a climate camp, visited the London Climate Camp at Blackheath. The people were friendly, visitors were welcomed and the aims and ethos of camp were explained - essentially building a grass roots movement to combat climate change.

Camp decision making was by consensus and all shared in the work needed to keep the camp operating smoothly.There was a programme of workshops open to all, and in attending some of them, it was clear that the facilitators were knowledgeable about climate science and politics.

People attending the workshops, while coming to climate change issues from a diverse range of perspectives, respected the views of others, and discussion was lively.

The London Climate Camp was peaceful with the police mainly represented by a camera overlooking the camp from a tall crane well outside the perimeter.

The climate camp members, young and old and from all social backgrounds, are working to raise public awareness about the effects of human induced climate change, which will have massive impacts on all countries in the world (impacts that include expanding deserts, water and food shortages, sea level rise, storms and flooding, mass migration...) unless the causes of climate change are addressed with great urgency the next few years.

The climate camp movement is trying to draw the attention of politicians and business leaders to the unique and unprecedented dangers posed by human induced climate change, circumstances which need an entirely different scale of political response from governments.

Business as usual is not an effective way forward if the most serious impacts of climate change are to be avoided. The introduction within the next few years, of radical and effective policy measures to combat climate change, developed with worldwide co-operation, is absolutely necessary.

Views expressed in this blog post do not necessarily represent those of climate camp as a whole